


Ikezukuri

by Querego_sour



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Asthenophilia, Awesome!Garth, Blood and Gore, But please consider them incidental, Epistaxiophilia, Eventual Badass!Kevin, Force-Feeding, Gen, Harm to Baby, Hurt Castiel, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Everyone, Hurt Sam Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Metatron isn't even in this and he's a pain in the backside, Misc peripheral hunters, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Oodles of vomit, Possibly there are kinks studded through this like raisins in a belgian bun, Probable vorarephilia, Reference to sushi, Rituals
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2017-02-26
Packaged: 2018-08-11 17:26:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7901374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Querego_sour/pseuds/Querego_sour
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Updated at long friggin last...</p><p> Canon-divergent as of S7 finale;<br/>Dean and Castiel manage to nail the real Dick Roman with the bone washed in the three bloods of the fallen.<br/>Unfortunately, nothing happens.<br/>Things go south pretty fast from that point.<br/>While Kevin manages to escape, the Winchesters have gambled and lost, with some deeply unpleasant consequences.<br/>The Leviathan in turn have made a crucial mistake, and given in to a tendency to play with their food.</p><p>Do NOT read if you have a delicate disposition, all sorts of graphic content. I can't seem to help it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. On The Hoof

**Author's Note:**

> Uh. This has probably been done before kind of a lot. Just... drop a hint if I'm embarrassing myself here ^_^;  
> I just really, really wanted that stupid bone to fail. Too easy, you know?

Nothing happened.

They’d been lucky, up to that point, Dean realised. They’d crept undetected through the corridors at Sucrocorp, steps muffled by the drab carpet tiles. Dean’s heart had been pounding so hard, he could feel it in his teeth. They’d found the real snake’s head among all the dummies, thanks to Cas, and managed to get close enough to drive that old nun’s thighbone right through him.

Nothing happened.

Just like nothing had happened when he and Sam had anointed the stupid thing in the first place.  
They should have known it was a dud. But they'd gone ahead anyway.  
They were so screwed.  
Dick watched the mortification bloom greyish on Dean’s face, grin spreading on his own.  
“Nice try, kids,” he tugged the bone out of his neck and tossed it into a handy trashcan. "But, no cigar.”

Things went south very fast around that point.

Dick had Dean by the throat before they had a chance to run. With Dean’s airway squeezed under his fingers, there was no need to worry about Castiel going anywhere. Dean had a brief flash of gratitude that at least Sam wasn’t with them, because there was a strong possibility he was about to get his face bitten off. He couldn't force enough air through his throat to yell at Cas to get out. As if he would. The angel blinked across the few feet of space between them, and got nothing but a handful of air and Dick’s fist punched through the flesh below his sternum, up and under. It happened too fast for Dean to follow. The Leviathan flicked the angel aside with no visible effort, like a mildly bothersome insect. Castiel’s torso split at the lower ribs, spilling red and black. He left a wet smear on the wall as he dropped to the carpet with a weak, gurgling cry, curling up tightly with his arms wrapped around himself. Dean saw pale flickers that spelled bad news more than the blood did, smelled copper and ozone.  
Dick crossed the room to the desk he'd previously been settled at, dragging Dean along almost as an afterthought. It left his feet in contact with the floor and took the pressure off his throat for a moment, allowed him to suck in a couple of breaths and clear the swarming black blotches away. Dick pressed a button on the desk console and said simply, "Housekeeping."  
Dean, throat burning, wheezing a useless string of obscenities, tried to lash out at the Leviathan holding him. It was like kicking concrete. All he did was make Dick chuckle, and deepen the bruises on his own neck. Dick wasn't kept waiting for more than a few moments, idly licking his bloodied fingers with a thoughtful look.  
A few of the lesser Leviathan appeared, expressions showing varying degrees of mild curiosity at the angel bleeding on the floor. This was replaced with a certain amount of trepidation as they noted the gradually closing hole in Dick's neck, and the human trying to pry himself out of the Leviathan's grip.  
"Would someone like to tell me... how _these_ got in here? Did we leave a window open?" Dick asked, with an edge of false levity. For a moment, none of them dared to answer.  
"Sir..." one of them began, faltering when Dick's flat, increasingly impatient gaze focused on him.  
The other two shared a glance, and took a discreet step back.  
"...There's been some trouble. A demon - "  
Dick cut him off with a tight smile and a raised finger. "How about, you give me the details, once you can do so in the _past tense_."  
The servile monster nodded eagerly, and was about to start pouring out assurances. At that point Dean, feeling their attention slip away from him for a second, wrenched himself out of Dick's grasp, leaving livid marks around his neck. Dick closed his eyes with an exasperated sigh as the human scrambled away, shoving aside the furniture scattered by Castiel's flung body.  
Instinct sharply goaded Dean to flee; the opportunity was there, door not even closed and no Leviathan between him and the empty corridor. But he couldn't leave his friend any more than Castiel could have left him behind. He dropped to crouch by the angel, and had perhaps all of four seconds trying to rouse him, looking desperately for some sign of life. He was unmoving, eyes rolled up to the shivering whites, a thin line of blood oozing from the corner of his mouth.  
"Cas! Cas, _please_ , you gotta get - " Dean didn't get to the end of the hoarse, cracked sentence before he was heaved back by the collar, the suited Leviathan eagerly seizing an excuse to leave before Dick got into a bibbing mood over this embarrassing lapse.  
"Let me just get rid of this for you, Sir." The Leviathan coolly ignored the human's furious struggles, which were frankly pathetic, doing him about as much good as a toddler having a tantrum in a supermarket.  
"Hold on just a tick there." Dick beckoned the leviathan forward, Dean in tow.  
"I'm going to assume that the other half of your sad little double act is around here somewhere." It wasn't really a question. Dean kept his mouth shut and his eyes peeled. What for, he didn't know. There was no way he could run and ditch Castiel. His exit route was gone anyway - a few more leviathan had showed up to spectate, loitering around the door.  
Dick tipped his head and peered at Dean, arranging his features in a caricature of confusion.  
"Seriously though, what was a piece of old bone meant to do to me?"  
Dean glared silently in response.  
"I don't suppose it matters now, anyway. You're done." Dick grabbed Dean's jaw and turned him roughly to look again at the angel. "But before I eat you, I just want you to know what a huge favour you've done me. Done all of us."  
Dean clenched his jaw and said nothing. He knew he'd fucked up, and _hard_. He could feel his pulse thumping sickly at the base of his throat, mind going in circles desperately trying to think of something, anything. At this point, all he could think about was what it was going to feel like getting eaten.  
Inches from his face, Dick's grin began to broaden grotesquely. Razor teeth began to glitter through the thin disguise.

A hovering leviathan, wearing the shape of the research assistant she’d consumed and replaced, cleared her throat and tentatively raised a hand.  
“Ah, sir?”  
Dick turned smoothly to see who'd had the temerity to interrupt him. "What?"  
"... Can I have that?" she asked,  
There was a taut little pause from Dick. " _What?_ "  
"That one," the subordinate pressed on. "Can I have it?"  
Dick blinked. "...Did you come up here to bum a _snack_?" he snapped incredulously. "Get back to work unless you want to be dessert!"  
"Sir, that's not what I meant..." She scurried over, unperturbed, bending close to Dick and quickly murmuring something.  
After a moment or two, the irritation left Dick's face, replaced by a growing look of delight and amusement. With a laugh, he rose and clapped the researcher on the shoulder. “Actually, I like that."  
There was a murmur of interest from the dozen or so creatures watching.  
"I like it!" Dick repeated. The sharklike hints of his real face slipped back out of sight.  
I'm going to give you the green light to go ahead.” The researcher bent close again, and there was another second or two of murmuring. Dick cut her off, flapping a hand dismissively. "Yes, and the other one, why not."

Dean's stomach somehow dropped even further through the floor. _Other one_. They hadn't been looking at Cas.  
" _Shit_..." the whisper escaped through his teeth. Dick turned a big, gleaming smile on him.  
“Oh, come on. There’s no need for that attitude.” The monster slung a friendly arm around Dean’s shoulders, turning him towards the doorway.  
He was shoved into the arms of the female-looking leviathan who'd asked if she could have him. Reflexively Dean froze; waiting for the teeth. Instead of anything taking his head off, though, Dick kept grinning, and kept talking.  
“… As I was just discussing with my colleague, I’m willing to turn this into a positive. Dean, you can actually help us.”  
Dean stared at him, seriously confused.  
"What?" He didn't know what the fuck Dick was talking about but it couldn't be anything good.  
“Hear me out. Picture this;” Dick swept his hand through the air, as if gazing at some invisible panorama.

“We’re willing to offer you an… opportunity to contribute to Roman Enterprises’ innovative research projects.” The phrase rolled slickly off his tongue and he paused, as if stifling laughter.  
“What…” Dean swallowed, feeling the dragging ache in his swollen throat. “… What the hell does that even mean?” He was starting to get a sick, sinking feeling he could guess the answer.  
Dick grinned, gleefully watching the fear and dismay washing over the doomed little ape. “It means, the company is doing some great work here, and you know, there's no reason why you can’t be a part of it.”  
There was a chorus of snickers from the peanut gallery.  
_Fuck_. That sounded like Dean was going to become some kind of soyalent green or something. A mental image suddenly formed; being recycled into weird meat products, packaged and scattered across the shelves of roadside stores across the country. The dreadful thought struck him, right in the pit of the stomach, that he wasn't going to be seeing Sam again.  
No. He couldn't start thinking like that. He wasn't dead yet. They were in deep, deep shit, but giving up wasn't an option.  
Dean hoped his brother had cottoned on that something had gone wrong and was working on being a long goddamn way from here. Fat chance of him having that much sense, though.  
But. Not getting eaten right this minute meant the Leviathan were overconfident. More likely to be complacent, so he had to stay alert for the slightest chance at escaping. Disarmed and not likely to find borax lying around, he would just have to run for it. Maybe hide, somehow. He'd have to find Sam first; they'd have a better chance at saving Cas together. Because the angel was still alive; hurt, but not killed. If being red-misted by the devil himself couldn't make Castiel stay dead, some gooey piranhas from the great beyond couldn't do him in either. Dean clung to that conviction furiously.  
HIs little burst of determination did nothing to help matters in the short term; it didn't stop the lab-coated leviathan from dragging him away down the corridor, arms twisted high behind his back and boots scraping the floor. He still tested their hold, on the off chance one of them might slip. The male didn't respond, and the female snapped and gave him a little shake that wrenched his shoulders nastily.  
"Hey. I can still do what I need to do to you if you don't have any hands. Walk, or I'll start biting bits off."  
Grinding his teeth, Dean walked, wondering where the hell he was being taken. 

 

With one little pest removed, Dick turned his attention back to the bleeding, huddled form of Castiel. The angel's irises had rolled back down so that a sliver of blue was showing, and the tremors of wounded grace had quieted.  
The Leviathan regarded him thoughtfully, until some drone in shirtsleeves and an ugly tie interrupted.  
"So... are you going to eat that one?"  
"Oh, no, no, no. I don't think so. Not yet." Dick nudged Castiel's ashy face with the toe of one immaculately polished shoe.

“You're a very special angel, aren't you? Just look at what you've achieved. You’ve ushered us into paradise… and now you've even assured our future here.”  
Dick leered down at the wounded angel, tongue sliding thoughtfully along his lower lip, anticipation oiling each word. “It’s going to be one big feast from here on in,” he pronounced with relish. “And I think a celebration’s in order, am I right?” He glanced over his shoulder and grinned at the Leviathan remaining, watching avidly as their boss leaned in close to his prey.  
“It’s been a loooong time since I tasted seraph.”  
Dick snapped his fingers and pointed at the underling who'd addressed him, without looking up. “Call the Tokyo office. I want to speak to whoever ate that Jiro Ono guy, last month."  
"Of course, si- "  
"Scratch that, just get him on a flight. I want this -” and he twirled a finger at Castiel, still unmoving “ – bagged to go. Pronto.” He looked over the angel greedily once more, and announced;  
"I've just had a little inspiration."

______________________________________________________________

 

Several floors away, Kevin Tran sat still, controlled his breathing, and tried to decide how much longer he should wait for Sam. Half an hour ago, the hunter had busted the door down like some sort of redneck commando, thrown corrosive stuff on every Leviathan that came near him, and got busy with the biggest machete Kevin had ever seen. Only machete Kevin had ever seen. He’d left smoking body parts strewn all over the corridors, warned Kevin not to touch any of them, not to step in the bubbling, chemical-stinking liquid pooling on the floor.  
“What the hell is that stuff?”  
“Borax. They don’t like it.” Sam answered without looking at Kevin, peering around the door for a moment and then beckoning him to follow.  
“Right. Borax kills the monsters. Of course.” He followed the hunter, automatically keeping the tablet in a firm grip. He was almost lightheaded with relief. At least, until Sam had stopped, a distinct look of apprehension creeping into his face.  
“They're not dead...” he muttered, distractedly.  
“They look pretty killed to me.”  
“It doesn’t last. They get up again.”  
Kevin’s eyes widened, darting over the scalded shapes lying around. “You’re shitting me!”  
Sam didn’t answer, just held out a hand in a shushing gesture.  
“What, what is it?” Kevin clutched at the tablet reflexively, tight against his chest.  
“It’s… way quieter than it should be, by now.”  
Kevin’s look of incomprehension went unnoticed as Sam stood, listening.  
“So? Quiet’s good. I’m happy with quiet. And what do you mean, ‘by now’? What’s going on?”  
Sam had been silent for a moment, vacillating. Then he’d turned to the teenager, gripped his shoulders and given some half-assed reassurances as he hurriedly pushed a cellphone into Kevin’s pocket. Kevin couldn’t make his fingers uncurl from the tablet. Sam said he would come back, and trotted down the corridor, out of sight.

That had been twenty minutes ago. He hadn’t come back, and now the monsters had stopped smoking and started to… coagulate back together, pretty rapidly.  
Kevin, muttering to himself, finally decided he couldn’t wait any longer. He didn’t have a weapon, stupid tablet probably wouldn’t have let him hold one anyway. Eyeing the disturbingly mobile heads and limbs, he hurried past them.  
He hated to ditch the Winchesters if they were in trouble – scratch that, of course they were in trouble – but desperate lone rescues were beyond him. And he needed to find his mom, somehow. 

Kevin gathered himself as best he could, and proceeded to walk calmly down the stained carpet of the hallway. Not slowly, but calmly; checking around the corners, ready to sprint if anything even looked at him. 

He stayed cool and collected until he came to a fire escape. Then he ran like hell. 

When he reached the front of the building, he stopped, panting for breath.

There was no sign of Meg. Kevin guessed it must have been the demon who did… _this_. 

There were Leviathan lying in pieces all over Sucrocorp’s forecourt. The place was a mess – burn marks and strange gouges streaked the concrete, black stuff was splattered all over the place, decorating the exterior walls. One of the front doors was smashed in, along with a few windows. An oily, black shape sprawled, half-on-half-off a patch of grass, with some lumps a little beyond it. These turned out, as Kevin skirted them nervously, to be heads. It seemed like more than one belonged to the same body; the eyeless, toothy things were still leaking slime, and they looked to have been torn off raggedly. Boric acid lay in steaming puddles all over the place.  
No bystanders or lookie-loos had shown up to stare or take pictures of the bizarre carnage. The thought briefly occurred to Kevin that there might not be any people left around here who were still people.

As he watched, saw the strings of goo between the heads and body thickening. Panic started to creep up on him as he threw a glance over his shoulder – the other Leviathan must have been doused earlier, and had already started pulling themselves together, beginning to move around, burning lesions slowly disappearing. Sam was right, you could put them down but not out. Kevin got the sinking feeling the Winchesters must have failed at whatever they were trying to do. He told himself again, he’d have helped them if he could. But he couldn’t. 

Kevin really, really hoped that the key was still in Dean’s chevy and that the vehicle wasn’t too smashed up to start. He wasn’t sure if this was the best idea, but he was short of options and didn’t think trying to get away on foot would be any good either.  
He yanked the driver’s side door open, hurriedly swept the crumbs of glass off the seat, dropped into the car, and froze.  
He knew how to do this. Stick and everything. But for a clear five seconds, he couldn’t remember the first damn thing about driving. Turn the car on. Grope for keys, yes, still in the ignition. Turn. The car made awful noises, but yes, it moved. Kevin looked over his shoulder, through the back window and felt his heart try to jump out of his body. There was one of them right there, inches from the back bumper and looking right at him. And another, reaching for the passenger door. He wrenched the car into reverse; pulled it around as fast as it would go – not fast enough, stupid boat – and thought he heard something thump against the passenger window.  
Getting the car pointing the right way, Kevin squeezed his eyes shut and accelerated, expecting a sudden bang and a dead engine at any moment. It didn’t happen. The steering felt wobbly and it pulled to the left, but it kept going as he got out onto the road. He was doing it. He was getting away. He had no idea where the hell he was going to go, but seeing the glowering monsters falling behind in the rear view mirror was probably the biggest relief he had ever felt, even tempered as it was by the guilt pinching at him. He hadn’t known the Winchesters long, but it was still shitty that they were probably dead right now. 

Kevin picked a direction he hoped would lead away from… everything, and just drove as fast and as far as he thought the car could manage. There was a lot of crunching and grinding going on under the buckled hood, and the steam coming from somewhere in there would definitely attract attention in short order. This was like one of those stress dreams where he was just running and running and running from some nebulous, unseen bad guys, except he always woke up from those before they ever caught him. Kevin dearly wished he would just wake up at home, in his own bed, but there was no use kidding himself. This total fucking absurdity was really happening to him.  
The grinding noises got worse as he went on, until he was pretty sure something was going to explode or catch fire if he kept going. He looked around for somewhere to pull off, a rest stop or a side road or something. This stretch of two-lane was not the kind of place with a lot of picnic areas. He did spot somewhere a little while later; an overgrown side road he almost drove past. It didn’t lead anywhere, there was a gate, chained up, after a few yards, but there was a ditch to one side. It would have to do. Rolling to a stop, he turned towards the scrubby dip, straightened the wheels, left the brake off, got out, pushed. Gravity was on his side; the wheezing, creaking car got shoved into the undergrowth, branches squealing along the paintwork.  
“Sorry, Dean,” he said quietly.  
The ditch wasn’t deep enough to swallow it, so it just settled there, looking pathetic, tipped on its side. Kevin broke a few boughs behind it and hoped that no-one gave enough of a shit about this stretch of road to come and check for this sort of thing.  
Now he had to hide himself. He’d seen a few cars, but not another face for hours. He felt a bit better about that, but he couldn’t jump in a bush and hope everything went away. Once more, he picked a direction and kept moving.

It took the rest of the day, to find somewhere he felt hidden enough to take a rest. He spent hours walking along the side of the road, listening for the sound of cars. A couple passed but it seemed like the drivers didn't spare him a second glance. He didn't feel like he could just strike out across the empty fields or into the woods without getting hopelessly lost. The day was damp. Dripping tree branches pared down to black fingerbones did nothing to hold off the chilly, creeping drizzle that gradually seeped in around the edges of his clothes as he walked.  
A thick, fuzzy grey twilight eventually descended, dimness that made everything look low-resolution. By that point, it was a case of settle soon, or drop.  
It was still a long hour before Kevin saw a half-finished housing development from the road, and started looking for a way through the fence to make his way up to it. His feet were wet and sore, shoes ruined with sticky, gritty mud.  
On closer inspection, the site looked kind of a mess. Maybe the company had gone under or something. There was a lot of exposed concrete streaked with mildew, and stagnant water collecting in tarpaulins scattered around the place, but some of the houses-to-be had roofs and windows in place. Kevin picked one, slumped down on a convenient bag of sand, and tried to think about what to do next without having some kind of panic attack.  
He seriously needed to find somewhere he could stay away from demons, as well as keeping his head down in case he got spotted by Leviathan. They all looked human, too, until it was too late. Needed salt. Didn’t have any salt. All he had was this stupid rock. If he could have dropped it down a sewer grate, he’d have happily done so, except just thinking about it made his hands tighten until his fingertips pressed white. He had his wallet, his cards, but was too scared to use them. He knew enough about criminals getting caught that way to figure it wasn't worth risking it.  
He sat there, as it got darker, thinking. Trying to come up with some sort of plan. There was nowhere he could try to get to that would be safe, and even if there was, he had no way of getting there. He was already horribly tired, cold, and thirsty, and he couldn't see shit. No idea how the fuck to even try to start a fire or something. Wondered where his mom was, if she was alive. He tried hard not to circle that thought, tried to squeeze out any images of her hurt. Tears threatened, building pressure behind his eyes. He had to focus on what he was going to _do_. He still had the tablet; probably that was still in demand, and he was still in demand along with it. Maybe he could... find an internet cafe or something. Try to negotiate without giving away his location. Demand proof that she was okay.  
All of that seemed like the shittiest stack of ideas, bound screw up and get her killed. He didn't even know where the fuck he was to begin with.  
Kevin was jolted violently from his thoughts by a hideously loud jangling sound and pale, blinking light. It took several seconds to realise what the hell it was coming from. The cell Sam had shoved into his pocket back at Sucrocorp. He’d completely forgotten about it. Kevin fumbled the little chunk of plastic out of his pocket and squinted at the screen.  
Maybe he should ignore it. It could be anyone; he had no idea who the fuck 'Garth' might be. He could ignore it, and sit in the cold trying to control his spiralling panic.

Hands shaking, Kevin thumbed the green-backed button on the left to accept the call.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _on the hoof_  
>  phrase  
> 1.  
> (of livestock) not yet slaughtered.
> 
> 2\. (Informal)  
> without proper thought or preparation.
> 
> Hi there, thanks for reading! Seriously. First attempt at a multi-chapter fic, here's hoping it doesn't completely stink.  
> There are many authors on AO3, who have posted classy, mature, original, thoughtful work. I suspect I am, alas, not of that ilk, so here's some excessive violence instead.  
> I have a sneaking feeling that this chapter is pretty sloppy, but any feedback would be grand.  
> If you haven't already heard of ikezukuri (or ikizukuri), look it up for a spoiler ;)  
> _____  
> 


	2. Gavage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Leviathan continue to enjoy themselves at humanity's expense in general, and the Winchesters' in particular. The boys might be in dire need of a rescue, but unfortunately they aren't at the top of anyone's list of priorities just at the moment.

‘Garth’ sounds relieved, almost elated, to have his call answered, for all of two seconds.  
Kevin took a deep breath and cut him off. “I’m not Sam.”  
There was a beat of silence. Garth sounds momentarily taken aback, then his tone hardens.  
“What... Well then, who are you – and why d’you have his phone?”

Kevin stammered for a moment, and did his best to explain; he ended up backtracking a lot, but he was glad he was talking to someone at least somewhat predisposed to believe the more bizarre parts of the story.

Garth seemed prepared to accept the whole prophet thing, too. He didn’t even sound particularly shocked. He sounds dismayed, however, when Kevin tells him the Winchesters had a plan, but disappeared at Sucrocorp and never showed up again.  
“Oh, no. Oh, heck. This is too much. First Bobby - ”  
Garth’s voice cracked a little, which was mildly surprising to Kevin. Was this guy seriously a hunter? Because he sounded like he might be about to start blubbing over the phone. There was a beat of silence, then Garth seemed to gather himself. “You sure they didn’t make it?”  
“No. I - I don’t know. I didn’t stick around.” Kevin admitted, with a pang of guilt he told himself was irrational.  
He heard a slow, controlled breath. In, and out.  
“Okay, first things first. You got out of there, but you still have this tablet, which they want, and only you can read.”  
“Yeah. Pretty sure they’ll be after me. They’re probably looking for me right now, and I have to -”  
“Easy, easy.” Garth cut him off gently. “I am going to come and find you, and get you somewhere safer,” he assured.  
“You have to watch out, they look -”  
“Just like people. I know.”  
“Okay, yeah. I know. How soon do you think you can you get here?”  
“Well that depends where ‘here’ is, why don’t you tell me what you can about where you’re at. We’ll figure it out.” 

It takes the rest of the night for Garth to narrow down the location from Kevin’s description, then drive out and find him. He brought another hunter along, just in case.  
He felt grateful for the backup; there seemed to be a disproportionate number of cop cars in evidence for practically empty roads in the small hours. They all ignored Lamar’s battered Jeep Wrangler anyway, intent on something else.  
When they arrived at what they thought was the right place, the hunters pulled up a little ways down the road, cautious. Their footsteps crunched faintly on the wet grit, but they didn’t wave flashlights around, just let their eyesight adjust as they picked their way through the jumbled maze of decaying construction materials. Kevin didn’t answer at first when they called out, unsure if he should hide in case the approaching footsteps didn’t belong to humans. When he eventually did emerge, both hunters picked up right away how shellshocked the teenager was, pale and sunken-eyed. They approached him carefully, both used to dealing with variously traumatised people. “Before we go anywhere, we gotta check you, okay?” Lamar showed him the silver knife, holy water, and the bottle of boric acid. “D’you know what these are for?”  
Kevin nodded, but they talked him through it anyway, first showing him the small nicks and splashes that verify their probable humanity, then doing the same to him. Whatever solution they were using left an itchy sting lingering faintly on his forearm, but they were mutually satisfied and quickly made their way back to the car, where Garth coaxed him to accept a plastic mug of tea from the thermos he kept handy. Kevin eyed him for a moment.  
“What?”  
“Nothing. Just… not what I was expecting.”  
“I get that a lot.”

They don’t get to talk much on the drive; Garth turns the heat up and that, plus his exhaustion and spent adrenaline, has Kevin slumped against the window and quietly snoring in a few minutes, still clutching the crude stone tablet.  
He wakes up unsure how far they’ve gone, pulling into the parking lot of what looks like a motel, but not a chain he recognises. It’s a heavily overcast day, and he’s not entirely sure what time it is. Garth’s snatching a little sleep in the passenger seat himself, so Lamar explains that the motel is owned by a good friend, who’s letting a small gaggle of hunters take it over on account of the emergency situation at hand, vis a vis, the unkillable monsters eating people all over the goddamn place. A few thoughts about eggs and baskets passed through Kevin’s mind, but he didn’t voice them. Lamar woke Garth up with a nudge to the ribs. They were met at the door by a lean, stern-faced black woman with, Kevin couldn’t help but notice, really nice hair. She didn’t speak until they’d offered their arms and she’d splashed all three of them with that borax solution – which still stung ever so slightly – and again with holy water. Then she jabbed each one of them with what Kevin assumed must be a silver pin, making another little mark just under the cut from earlier. He’s glad she didn’t use another knife, because he gets the feeling that they’re all going to have to do this a lot. 

Sitting down to talk later, Garth was, briefly, a little taken aback that Kevin had taken Dean’s chevy and taken off. But he understood that Kevin wasn’t a hunter, wasn’t trained to fight monsters, and the accusations Kevin had been sort of expecting never came.  
He breathed out a long sigh. “With Bobby gone and this ritual a no-go, we’re left turning in the wind, here.”  
“It should have worked. I read it from the tablet, but…”  
“Well, something must have gone wrong. I’m not much of a dabbler, but we’ll have to try again.”  
“That’s just it, we can’t – it says we need, among other things, blood from their crazy angel friend.”  
“Uh, Castiel.”  
“Him, yeah. I think he was with them, and he didn’t come back either.”  
Garth takes another deep breath and seems about to respond, when his cell rings. He glances at the screen. His face falls. “I gotta take this...” he sits up straighter, and steels himself to give Jody Mills more bad tidings.

The hunters Garth had managed to pull together - Lamar, Dana and Gene - had not taken the news about the Winchesters as hard as he thought they might have. He’d even caught some mutters about them being better off, ‘handling this without those two shit-magnets in the picture’. Garth thought that was unfair, especially coming from someone who’d never met either brother. It ticked him off more than a little, but right now he was too tired and overwhelmed to give them a talking-to about it. There wasn’t time to start an argument. He just waited for them to stop making justifications and get back to making plans.  
Dana spread her hands wide as if to say what do you want me to do “Look, I’m not glad about it. I’m just not rushing to put my head on the chopping block for those two.” This was met with general mutters of agreement. “I’m not saying I wouldn’t help ‘em if we could, but...” she trailed off with a shrug. 

Kevin stayed with them over the next couple of days. They didn’t seem too bothered about keeping an eye on him, barring the expected complaints about babysitting. Garth explains to him what to do if anything happens – shows him the exits, the salt lines, the wards. Tells him to run straight for the Jeep if they have to get out of here for any reason, and where the emergency key is hidden.  
Otherwise, Garth was on his phone a lot. He got no answer and no call back, much of the time, but he’d still managed to get a fair few hunters to feed back to him with anything that looked like Leviathan activity.  
There was a big map the hunters had taped up on the wall in the lobby, such as it was, with pins in it and scrawled notes around the edges. Left to himself, Kevin went through them methodically, looking for anything that might relate to himself or his mother. He found some disturbing stuff; A scrawled map with a photo of a school clipped to it, with the words ‘Empty! No reports?’ written underneath. There was an article cut from a magazine with a recent date on it – half a whale washed up on beach, unidentifiable bite marks. ‘Megalodon Real?’ the headline reads.  
There was nothing that looked useful.  
Eventually, with some trepidation, he tried a prayer. Angels were supposed to protect prophets, even if they did have some weird ideas about what that entailed.  
No angels appeared. Which seemed weird, because they couldn’t wait to get their hands on him before. It was pointless to puzzle over it, but that didn’t stop him.  
He was broken from his reverie by the hunter Garth had introduced simply as Gene. The broad, bald man didn’t speak much. In fact Kevin wasn’t sure he’d heard him say anything other than ‘yup.’ Now, he simply knocked on the wall to get Kevin’s attention, and handed him a plastic bowl of what looked, and smelled, like home-made soup. It wasn’t exactly great, but it was safer than takeout. Gene didn’t hang around to hear his muttered ‘thanks.’ When he looked up, the only person in sight was Garth, ambling over with a tall mug of probably the same soup. He pulled a smile from somewhere and sat next to Kevin, looking like he wanted to talk.  
“So.”  
“So...”  
“How’re you holding up?”  
Kevin gave him a blank, measured look. Garth appeared to be immune to it. Kevin gave in.  
“How do you think I’m doing? My life is a horror movie.”  
“Hey. It’s not over yet. You wouldn’t believe the kind of setbacks I’ve seen some of these guys get around. We are gonna get on top of the situation, you’ll see.”  
“Setbacks. Right.” Kevin answered slowly. “Tell that to m - the Winchesters.”  
Garth’s smile faltered. “It’s a shame, but when it comes to hunting, sometimes that’s the way the cookie crumbles.” He shook his head sadly. “Dean’s nuts about that car… he’s gonna be real cut up about it.”  
Kevin took a moment to process that. “Yeah. He should be so lucky,” he muttered under his breath. He would be surprised if the car ever became an issue, but he was reluctant to puncture Garth’s optimism any further. It seemed to be what was keeping him afloat.

\------

 

Dean was not feeling lucky. Dean was feeling, among other things, epically nauseous.

He’d been herded down a tangle of corridors by a pair of Leviathan, trying to keep track of where he was going, keep alert for any chance to get away or any sign of where his brother might be. It proved to be pretty futile, and he saw nothing that might help him.  
The monster that had approached Roman to ask for Dean looked like a dark, pinch-faced man somewhere in his forties. The other one was masquerading in a woman’s form, chestnut-haired and perversely motherly-looking. They kept up a casual stream chatter between colleagues as they forced him along, talking about ‘boosting their numbers’ and ‘offsetting losses.’ They also bitched about someone called Oliver, presumably another Leviathan.  
The building around him included more concrete than plasterboard as they went on; windows disappeared, and the smell of blood and disinfectant gradually crept into the air. Other Leviathan bustled about, and Dean wondered how many there were in this building or facility or whatever. Before long he began to hear strange and unpleasant noises echoing down branching corridors. They eventually turned down one of them, those noises getting clearer. Human voices, wordless and distressed, humming machinery, metallic rattling.  
He already had a very, very bad feeling about this, and it suddenly got exponentially worse.  
As they arrived at their destination, Dean’s jaw dropped, and for a moment he couldn’t do anything but freeze up and gape in horror. He was brought into a large space, all stained concrete and metal and animal stench, stale sweat and waste with a kind of gross, meaty odour under it. The enormous room was filled to the point of claustrophobia, packed floor to ceiling with stacked rows of cages not much bigger than coffins. He could see tubes of various sizes snaking in and out of them, in and out of the dozens of people stuffed inside.  
Dean’s resolution to keep his cool rapidly went out the window. He planted his feet and sagged at the knees, trying to drop and scramble away. The monsters holding him just lifted him bodily off the floor.  
“Oh, fuck no. Jesus Christ, what are you doin’ to those poor people!?”  
“Hold still and you’ll find out.” The woman was unpleasantly chipper-sounding. Fighting these things was still like trying to wrestle a statue, no matter how he threw his weight.  
With a faintly put-upon air, as if this was a menial task they had grown used to, she jabbed something sharp into his neck, and a dreadful, tingling coldness immediately swept through him. His joints went marshmallow-soft and gave out on him, his limbs turning impossibly heavy. He struggled a few moments longer, willing his body to ignore the drug, to no avail. Soon he could barely twitch a finger; even moving his eyes felt like rolling heavy stones uphill.  
While the motherly-looking one held him casually by the scruff, the other pulled out a gurney-like thing and a table loaded with a variety of ominously-shaped stainless steel and plastic objects. He was hauled up and dumped onto the metal tray like a bag of groceries, and stripped. They pinched and tore the clothes off him without effort, as if opening a bag of potato chips. His shirts went easily, though the tougher fabric of his jeans left ugly red marks. They ripped his boots apart to remove them, and even took his ring. A wave of fury flashed through him when they tossed it aside. They looked for signs of sickness or injury, pried his mouth open to check his teeth. It was a casual once-over; they already knew his height, weight, blood type, and so much more, after all.  
Dean snarled slurred curses at them, doing a poor job at hiding his fear. The instinct to struggle was still there, but his muscles had disconnected and his senses were lagging.  
Once he was naked, The female Leviathan looked him up and down. Normally, when a woman leered him like a piece of steak, it was less literal. Now, the monster produced a needle and jabbed it into Dean’s leg, swiping a finger through the trickle of blood and sucking it noisily.  
“Mmm, this is a good one...” she smacked a hand against his bare thigh and gave the muscle a firm squeeze, smearing the blood. “Already juicy.” The other one shot her a skeptical look over Dean’s prone body.  
“Really? Because I taste…” he pulled a distasteful expression as he dabbed a spot of Dean’s blood on his tongue, “liver damage and high cholesterol.” His colleague just grinned at him.  
“Nothing like junk food after hard work, am I right? Besides, we’ve been on an enforced diet for literal aeons. You don’t think we’re due a treat?”  
“Ugh. You’re a pig.” The male Leviathan stalked off, disappearing from Dean’s field of view.  
The first one screwed up her face childishly and taunted, ‘Picky, picky!’ at the other’s turned back, before swiping up another smear of blood and licking her fingers. Funny, Dean noted, somewhere in the back of his mind; the Leviathan seem to have this hive-mind thing going on, sort of, but at the same time there was a definite pecking order.  
The other Leviathan returned, wagging an admonishing finger his colleague. “I mean it! You can’t eat any more of these until we have our results for the boss.”  
There were more hands on him, more words, but he couldn’t keep track.  
The ceiling blurred, harsh lights sliding past, a seasick feeling rolled briefly through him at the movement. metallic rattle, realised they were taking him up to the cages. In quick succession, he felt pressure pinch down around his wrists, ankles, thighs, upper arms; then around his jaw and forehead.  
The next minutes were little bit hazy, but deeply unpleasant; there was the horrible sensation of a soft, greasy plastic tube sliding up his nose and curling down the back of his throat. He writhed against the restraints, but with his muscles watery and his head held immobile, there was nothing he could do to stop the tube inching down into his stomach. The ones stuck up his ass and slipped into his dick were quicker, and more humiliating. Even that wasn’t remotely the worst of it. He recognised the slimy grey liquid oozing through the system.  
Dean quickly developed an immediate, reflexive dread at the click-hum-gurgle of the machines, the sound they made when they were getting ready for a feeding.  
The first time, he’d thought they had made a mistake, pressed the wrong button and pumped too much slurry into him, litres of it, more than he could physically take. He’d been calling out despite himself, begging them to stop, convinced the machine had malfunctioned and it was going to keep going until his stomach burst inside him. There was no response to his sore croaking while his abdomen rapidly bloated; the sound was lost against a general background of churning pumps and despondent moaning.  
Being overfed so much, so fast was horribly painful. It quickly became hard to take a full breath.  
Even trying to tilt his head back to open his airway was impossible because of the tight restraints, keeping him still so he couldn’t disturb the feeding tube secured in his nose. Tears leaked from the corners of his eyes, and his ears were filled by the sounds of dozens of voices sobbing in misery. The sound tapered off over the next handful of minutes, quiet except for a few whimpers. He wondered if people had suffocated, until he heard a snore somewhere to his right. The other victims had been put through this god knew how many times before, their organs already distended to accommodate the forced glut. Full, they’d slipped into dopey food-comas.  
Dean was soon gasping alone, in relative silence. The mass of sludge made his stomach feel like a concrete ball pressing on his skin from the inside, squashing his lungs.  
He was left feeling hideously sick, trapped on his back, unable to even turn his head and desperately trying not to vomit for fear of going out like Bon Scott or Hendrix. His pulse ratcheted as he started to panic. Surely they couldn’t have gone to all this trouble just to let him die with a lungful of puke. He lay there, nails digging into his palms, fighting to control his breathing and waiting in vain for the feeling to pass or settle. It grew more intense as the minutes crawled by. He didn’t dare try to cry out, sucking air through clenched teeth and cracked lips. Just when he couldn’t hold on any more, his noisy, rapid breathing was finally noticed. A predator sensing distressed prey, a Leviathan he recognised from before approached. She popped the cage door and peered in at him for a moment. She didn’t release the straps holding him down, just rolled the shelf back and tipped it over to allow him to vomit with gravity rather than against it. He was finally able to let go and with a wet, gurgling belch, he threw up everything they’d pumped into him. The huge gouts of slime burned his throat and nose on the way up, splattered through the mesh of the walkway and dribbled down to floor level, draining towards a gutter in the centre of the aisle. Foul, chemical-smelling vomit was running down his face and chest, splashed in his hair, and all over the Leviathan’s shoes. It looked like snotty grey oatmeal with, of course, bits of carrot in it somehow.  
Dean’s guts ached, his lungs burned, and he had blue and white sparks pricking his vision. It was utter, fucking bliss. Never in his life had he thought throwing up could feel so good. The relief of having that awful pressure gone was so huge, it briefly blotted out the rest of his wretched situation, while he savoured the feeling of being able to fill his lungs.  
Distantly, he heard the Leviathan coordinator snap at someone. “‘N’other puker. Fix it up.”  
He had a handful of minutes to breathe freely before one of them came back and casually hosed him down. He tried to get some of the chilly, bleach-laced water in his mouth to wash the vomit out. They futzed around with the tubing, putting everything back where they wanted it. His bleary eyes widened in panic as he realised what they were about to do.  
‘Ready to re-feed on D-3!”  
“Nuh!” His voice came out a raw, cracked whisper distorted by the tube still in his throat. “Y’ can’t!”  
The upside-down face of another Leviathan popped into view, smirking.  
“Don’t you worry about it! We’re just helping you become a better you. In terms of flavour, that is,” He patted Dean’s face, locked him back into place, and ambled away, humming. About twelve seconds later, the machine whirred and gurgled and they force-fed him all over again, indifferent to his weak cursing and pleading. It was even more painful than the first time; his insides felt bruised, pulped. At some point, his vision tunneled, and he passed out.

After that, they made sure what they put inside him stayed inside him; he was given antinauseants along with god knew what else, and wound up going through days of agonising constipation, during which his keepers didn’t slow down the feeding no matter how much he howled and begged. Not that they ignored him; the problem was solved by the awful addition of laxatives to the sludge. He sobbed through hours of violent cramps, building layers of pain on pain. Judging by the farmyard cacophony of misery and stink coming from the cages all around him, his neighbours were all being subjected to the same approach.  
Time dragged on, leaden and indistinct.  
At intervals, he was checked and weighed and tasted. He was dimly aware of other captives being similarly evaluated, guessing by the noises going on around him.  
When hauled out, Dean tried to dredge up some embers of defiance; they were getting harder and harder to find, thoughts getting as slack as his body.  
“Ffug you,” was all he could manage. He was too tired to try to provoke them any more. It seemed increasingly pointless, anyway. They only taunted him with smug rejoinders.  
“Oh, Don’t be petty; you’re just jealous you’re not the apex predators any more.”  
The Leviathan that first hooked him up to this hellish contraption – literally, he would know – came to look in. Dean had mentally dubbed her Peckish. She always seemed to be. “He’s right,” she chimed in. “We don’t do anything you don’t do. We’re just better at it.” smiled brightly. Some of them enjoyed teasing their captives, and would do it when they were bored, not just verbally either. He bared his teeth at her halfheartedly, even as he felt his anger wilting in him, the sinking press of apathy sitting in his gut along with the hot, dense feed.  
He couldn’t see much other than the tubes passing in front of his face and the back of the neck of the woman directly above him, tangled with dull, sweat-damp hair.  
Dean couldn’t tell how long he was trapped there, held almost immobile. Long enough for the straps binding his limbs to start pinching tighter. He drowsed through the discomfort when he grew exhausted enough, only to be plagued by flashes of Castiel lying still and bloody. However, before very long had passed, that stillframe was beginning to lose its punch. He’d find himself slipping into a doze no matter how he dwelt on it, the knots of guilt and horror fading inside him.  
He tried to goad himself out of his creeping indifference, to think about what he would do if he somehow got out of the cage. He’d be slow, and unarmed; his chances would be better in the dark. But even if he did get out… He lost his train of thought and drifted for a while.  
Despite his fogged brain, still held a dull terror for Sam in his core. Where would they have taken him? He was sure that if Sam was in here anywhere, they would have heard each other. Tears of frustration slid down his temples to pool in his ears and drip onto whoever was trapped immediately below him.

\------

 

Sam himself was blissfully oblivious to the draining, hollowing experience his brother and many of the other research participants were going through. Once he’d been caught and subdued, he’d been handed off, put under, and kept under. The following days were spent mostly sedated, waking up intermittently with soaked, clotted packing filling his nose and a tremendous headache.  
This had led to him getting confused about what point in time he was inhabiting. He’d grown agitated several times, disoriented and trying to remember the vision he thought he must have been having, before he remembered that wasn’t happening any more. After the third time, they started adding something to the IV in his arm that made everything go warm and fuzzy and far away.  
Eventually, something woke him up again. He struggled to open his eyes and look around at first, feeling weird and heavy. He couldn’t smell anything, but the place felt... hospitally? Needles. IV. He could vaguely make out dotted puncture marks when he squinted down at his body, which looked… off, in some way. Pain radiated up and down his bones, brilliantly sharp. That might have been what jolted him out of the sleepy haze he’d been in. He didn’t feel any concern for some reason, didn’t think he was hurt. The pain, despite its sharpness, felt familiar, albeit in a way he couldn’t quite place.  
He couldn’t place much else, either. Couldn’t remember what happened or what he was doing here. Or where ‘here’ was. There were the sounds of people moving around behind him – Nurses? Dentist? It felt like he was in some sort of big, cushy chair. Maybe he’d been having teeth taken out. The room was obnoxiously bright, making his headache worse. A small noise of complaint escaped him as he squinted against the glare.  
“Well, look who’s awake.” He was addressed by a blurry silhouette. It didn’t sound like anyone he recognised. Gloved hands soothed him, the way someone might soothe a balky animal. Sam was starting to feel pretty uneasy, as he was baby-talked, the hands stroking his stomach. That was creepy. He would have batted her away, but his arms felt like overcooked noodles.  
“Looks like we need to up somebody’s dose again, yes we do. Who’s a growing boy, then?”  
_What._  
A motion to his left caught his eye; turned slowly. Someone dressed in white injecting something into a port in the IV line. He slipped back into sleep before he could open his mouth to protest. 

\-------

 

A little under a week had passed since arriving at the hunters’ occupied motel.  
Kevin couldn’t help noticing that Garth was looking pretty strung out. His breath smelled coffee-sour, his hair was a mess where he kept running his fingers into it and he was sporting a dark crop. of stubble under puffy, tired eyes. He still had a smile, though, which appeared whenever one of them started getting despondent. No matter how many people called him demanding to know where the hell Singer was. Gene and Dana disappeared for a couple of days, came back soaked and muddy. Returning, they made brief eye contact with the other hunters; a nod was all the exchange that passed between them. Kevin didn’t ask.

Now, they were finally getting ready to make a move, discussing what Sheriff Mills had relayed to Garth.  
“We know what they’re going to do.” Kevin had told them everything he remembered hearing, and together it painted a grim picture.  
“There’s no ‘going to’ any more, they’re doin’ it.”  
The hunters know what to look for by now. They were pretty sure they’d identified the first dreadful processing plant, marked on the lobby map with a big red ‘X.’ It wasn’t all that far from the Sucrocorp offices, which just seemed kind of lazy. It was barely even disguised, from what they’d heard.  
Dana spoke over her folded hands, brows knotted. “These things are getting bold, or impatient or whatever. Either way they’re not bein’ subtle about their intentions any more.” She jerked a callused thumb at a stack of notes numbering disappearances, most not even reported. “On the plus side, their security looks slack as shit. Unless of course that’s a trap.”  
Gene gave a kind of half-nod, half-shrug as if to say we’ll see.  
Garth nodded. “They said everybody they talked to for miles around was acting stoned, like they couldn’t even see something was wrong.” He looked at each hunter in turn. “So, we’ve got a choice between joining up with Sheriff Mills and sabotaging this… this slaughterhouse -” Garth tapped the spot on the map.  
Lamar broke in, dour-faced “And let me get this clear – the plan is to straight up bomb the shit out of it, any way they can?”  
“It’s come to that. Minor sabotage won’t stop it. If anybody has a problem with that, better say so now.”  
Lamar hummed thoughtfully, looking uncomfortable.  
“And the alternative?”  
Garth pointed at another spot on the map. “Or, us four here, not including the kid, head to where we think they’re holding these people, and bust them the heck out.”  
“I like that idea – if this Sheriff screws up, we have a shot at getting them out, and if we screw up, the slaughterhouse should be blown sky high.” 

Kevin was starting to think they’d forgotten him, and he was sick of sitting around waiting for the help he'd been promised.  
“Hey! What about my mom? You’ve been telling me you’re going to help me find her, and now you’re, you’re tearing off on some mission and leaving me behind?!”  
Dana raised an eyebrow at his outburst. “We don’t even know where your mom is, kid.”  
“No, but I can’t wait around any more. I have to do something. Those monsters have her.”  
Lamar “Son, we understand, but she’s not the only one they’ve taken. There’s a lot of people’s moms and dads and kids missing, people we’re pretty sure are still alive.”  
“My mom is alive!” Kevin’s voice cracks as he yells.  
“No-one’s saying she ain’t.” Lamar raised his hands in placating gesture “We’re not saying we won’t help you find her, but this has to come first.”  
Kevin rose to his feet, shoving the table back. “Is that right? Okay. You can’t help me. So I have to think of something myself. I’ve still got something they want.”  
The furious teenager stormed out, slamming the door open. “Why did I even let you bring me here?”  
Garth followed him out into the hallway at a trot. “Kevin! Please. I know you’re scared for her but please, don’t do anything nuts – don’t put yourself in danger. This is the safest place you can be right now, and hunters like us are your best chance at saving your mom. But there’s people who are gonna die if we don’t haul ass, because there is nobody else.”  
Kevin bites back the words ‘I don’t care,’ before they can come out. Garth tries a different tack.  
“Would she want you to go back to them?”  
Kevin rounded on him angrily. “Don’t you dare try that shit on me.”  
“Look, what I’m saying is. What would your mom tell you to do?”  
Kevin glared at him, mouth a tight, bloodless line. Garth held eye contact, and didn’t say any more. He seemed to be genuinely waiting for a reply. The silence stretched out into long seconds. Kevin thought about it.  
Garth might have a point. His mom would want him to do the smart thing.  
The teen’s knotted shoulders dropped, and he turned back.  
“So. What’s your plan, then?” Kevin asked tersely, leaning in the doorway. They all gave him similar looks of mixed skepticism and impatience at this relative stranger, this kid, suddenly getting into their business.  
Dana speaks up. “Oh, you want to know now? Kid, there’s not much we can do, except hit ‘em as hard as we can with what we’ve got.”  
Kevin sneers, his anger not yet cleared. “What, you’re going to run in there and hope you don’t all die? Is this a hunter thing? You’re just doing exactly what the Winchesters did, running in half-cocked, and look where it got them.” Three out of the four hunters respond in various tones of indignation to that.  
Dana glares at him coldly, losing patience. “I think you need to go back to your room and let us get on with our jobs, boy.”  
Kevin snorts at that. “You’re... trying to send me to my room? Get serious. If you have to do this before you’re going to help me, I want to know if you’re even going to last that long.”  
The long-muscled hunter unfolds from her chair and advances on him, looking like she means to drag him somewhere and lock him in until he stops being a pain in the ass. Garth intervenes, stepping between them, arms spread wide.  
“Whoa, easy, everybody. There is way too much hostility in this room. He’s a smart kid, and he’s been around these Leviathan things, seen them up close. Can’t we hear him out?”  
Dana huffs air through her nose and says nothing. Her expression telegraphs how stupid she thinks that is. Lamar is more willing to humour the teen.  
“Alright, do you have something you want to say, son?  
“Okay, firstly, my name is Kevin. Tran. And secondly...” Kevin opens his mouth, and for a second or two nothing comes out.  
“Secondly what?” Dana snaps.  
“Fire trucks.”  
“What?”  
Garth’s eyes light up as he catches on almost right away. “Do you mean what I think you mean?”  
He turns to Lamar, “Okay, what were you telling me earlier?”  
“That yours truly acquired a whole assload of concentrated borax solution stuff. Singer put out the word to get our hands on it, before somebody got him -”  
Kevin cut over him before he could finish that comment. “Yes. Steal a fire truck. Trucks, plural, if you can get them. You said everyone was stoned, right? You could probably walk right in there and take whatever you need. And... wood chippers. Acquire an assload of those. They can be cut up. The more pieces they’re in, the longer it takes them to get back together.” Kevin thought back to what he’d seen on the forecourt on the way out of Sucrocorp. “They won’t stay down, but it should give you a lot longer to get everybody out of there. You could steal a bus.”  
Dana actually looked impressed. “We thought about that, the bus. The trucks… we might actually be able to get those. That could work.”  
Kevin is on a roll, speaking in brisk, choppy sentences. “Four people isn’t enough. Call Sheriff Mills. Tell her to send as many bodies to us as she can, whoever she can spare.”  
Garth considers this. “It only takes one person to set a bomb...”  
“… But I think fire hoses aren’t so easy to operate, yeah.” Kevin tries to think how long a fire hose should be. He reaches for the laptop on the table and starts typing.  
Gene is already nodding, pulling a ‘not bad’ face.  
Lamar looks dubious at the mention of wood chippers. “Now wait, what about the people they’re possessing?”  
There’s a pause. Garth looks just a little embarrassed. “No, they’re not – Lamar, I explained this. They eat a person, then copy the person. And they get their memories, but the person’s dead.”  
“Oh. Right. Right.”  
Everyone else ignores the lapse, skipping ahead to start getting down to the nitty-gritty of planning the necessary thefts.  
Garth leans in and stage-whispers to Kevin, “I think you might be a genius.”  
The teenager shrugged. “Yeah, technically.”  
“I just hope we can pull this off before it’s too late. Then, I promise, we will find where they took your mom.”  
Nobody mentions the Winchesters again.

\---

Deep in the ‘product refinement’ wing of Sucrocorp, Dean continued to endure scheduled, automated feedings, and the cumulative effects that followed after.  
Other than his cramping insides and the squeeze of the straps, he more or less couldn’t feel a damn thing. _Careful what you wish for_ , he thinks dreamily.  
Footsteps and voices approached; he heard what he thought were complaints about his metabolism being too high. It’s Mr. Picky, highly-strung as usual.  
“Seriously, is this guy part hummingbird, or what? Look at this, he’s ruining our figures.”  
“He’s going to ruin my figure.” Peckish ran greedy eyes over him.  
“Damnit, can you stay focused for ten seconds? Neither of us is going to get any respect until we show the boss that we can come through. Stop eating he results!”  
Peckish gave him a flat, disbelieving look. “Are you seriously telling me not to eat people?”  
“Shut up and help me get rid of the duds.”  
Peering past his feet, Dean caught sight of a grossly obese figure being wheeled down the walkway. It was impossible to tell its sex, or whether it was alive. He couldn’t properly see Peckish intercept the lividly-streaked mass and take a bite, or the way she immediately pulled a face, and gobbed the huge chunk of lumpy yellow tissue into the central gutter. He could hear the disgusted noise she made, though.  
“Pleugh!”  
“Yeah, that’s why this is one for the burner,” an unseen Leviathan responds.  
He hears what sounds like a lot of trolleys rattling back and forth. The place fills with a sweet, greasy pork smell for the next several hours. Deans’ stomach rumbles. It’s not left empty for long, though. He hears the whir and gurgle of the pumps starting up for yet another feeding. 

Later, when all the lights had been shut down, Dean was drowsing again. He was woken up by the sound of furtive footsteps.  
“Which one... which one was it?” He heard the muttering voice counting down the rows in the dark. “D 1… 2… D3… 1N… 2N… 3N… Ha.”  
Peckish was back.  
She popped open the cage next to Dean’s with the air of a kid sneaking a dip into the cookie jar. Peering about one last time, she bared her real face, all blackly glistening flesh and gleaming teeth teeth teeth. The monster poked its shapeless head into the cage, and eagerly nibbled the drowsing man’s swollen abdomen open. He seemed slow to react at first, gulping air for a few seconds, only starting up a hoarse screeching when it buried its mouth in his stomach and pulled back, sucking his intestines down like fat, membrane-strung noodles. The screaming didn’t quite drown out the gleeful slurping and the wet rip and pop as the last shreds of tissue slipped out of sight into the Leviathan’s mouth. Dean thought the guy probably died of shock at that point, his scream dying down to a dry whistle.  
The people in the rows immediately beneath woke up wailing, one after the other, as they were treated to a waterfall of blood sluicing warmly over their immobile, upturned faces. Dean couldn’t turn his head enough to see, but he could hear it pattering down, and felt cast-off droplets on his bare skin. The Leviathan popped the straps holding the hopefully-dead man and gulped the rest of the body down headfirst, bare white feet vanishing into the black hole. Then he was gone, nothing left but a dripping stain on the trolley and the ringing in Dean’s ears.  
_How do you eat yours?_ The slogan dinged nonsensically in his brain.  
The monster smacked her- its – lips, grunting thoughtfully. It sounded unsatisfied.  
It lingered on the walkway for a moment, before exclaiming quietly to itself;  
“Oh, _4_ N. _4_ N…” The Leviathan disappeared from view for a few seconds, then Dean heard the clunk of the lock near his feet opening, and the faint squeak of it swinging open. Peckish smiled in at him.  
“There you are.”  
Lights burst on.  
“What. The. Fuck. Do you think you’re doing!?” Picky snapped from the doorway, sounding scandalised.  
He didn’t give the other monster time to snipe back at him, marching over and slamming the cage door shut.  
“I can’t believe you!” He blustered. “How can you even eat this crap? Do you have no self-control? Do you want to piss the boss off that badly? Because you are going to get us both bibbed -”  
Dean only had a partial view through the now-empty cage beside him, and could mostly see the bottom half of the squabbling monsters.  
Their argument cut off abruptly when Peckish lost patience, and ate her colleague, engulfing him in a single enormous bite.  
Out of the corner of his eye, Dean had a glimpse of a bulging, glutinous mass before it settled back down into the human shape it was wearing before. She belched sonorously. “Who needs a bib?” She asked no-one in particular.  
She seemed to have forgotten about Dean for the time being. She shut the lights off as she hurried out, and Dean slipped back into lethargy, spots of blood drying tacky on his skin.

\----

A couple of floors away, a narrow-faced Leviathan with a blonde ponytail who answered to ‘Oliver’ was talking a small group of subordinates through his pet project.  
This was preceded by an irritated chorus of, “We know! We already know!”  
He knows they’re all aware of the process he’s devised, but he wants to extract congratulations from them, if only because it vexes them so.  
“Ahem. As I was about to say. It’s easy to punch through the sphenoid sinus... here,” he indicates the spot with a laser pointer. “The bone’s thin… doesn’t really matter if the optic chiasm gets clipped. We get at the anterior pituitary... here... and then cauterize and give ‘em a slug of antibiotics. It looks messy, but we’ve had low infection rates, and minimal losses, which I know some of you will want to take note of.”  
Sour-faced Alec from the battery department appears not to have turned up, however. Not that he gives a damn.  
“Anyway. This can all be done in mere minutes. With access to ever-increasing resources, it should be feasible to mechanise this process so that we don’t have to stand around drilling into monkey skulls all day. We can just enjoy… the results.” He gestured to an assistant, who ducked through a plastic screen momentarily.  
She returned with something that could have been described as a homo sapiens deluxe. He had to duck his shaggy head as he was squeezed through the door; nude, the better to show the changes they’d made to his body. There was a general murmur of approval.  
“Now that looks… appetising.”  
The specimen had been rubbed down with lotion for his skin regularly during his finition. They displayed him clean-shaven, glossy, and showing barely any stretch marks. He didn’t flinch as he was turned, didn’t show any interest in his surroundings or the eyes running over him.  
“You can see how conveniently docile they are, how easily handled. Keeps the stress hormones down so as not to ruin the meat, even to the point of slaughter.” Oliver’s assistant slaps the human’s buttock to illustrate the point. He didn’t react, not even to shift his unfocused gaze from the middle distance.  
The audience are pleased enough not to point out that this specimen is a good example due to incomplete fusing of the epiphyseal plates, which meant that they were a lot easier to stimulate. It’s a waste of time to argue with the result. They sit licking their lips.  
The ponytailed Leviathan persists with his obnoxious preening. “I calculated the projected average for increase in weight at up to thirty pounds, with at least a ten-to-fifteen percent increase in mass within a fourteen day period. Mass production with no loss of quality or flavour.”  
“How do you know?” One of the Leviathan made a grab for the enormous, placid human, aiming for a bite. He was swatted away by Oliver. “Hey! No tasting! This is a presentation, not a free sample!”  
The other monster sneers, but he holds back. They’ve been promised a feast, and the anticipation is still delicious for now.  
Oliver waffles on, preening “Of course, I can’t take all the credit; couldn’t have done this without our colleagues in stem cell research. Once we’ve settled on a dose for the myostatin inhibitors, this little process is going to guarantee regular, measurable improvements in the end product.”  
“For crying out loud, Oliver, we know!” A member of the impatient audience bursts out. “What I want to hear is, when’s the dinner bell going to ring?”  
There’s a chorus of assent at that.  
“Yeah, when do we get to eat?”  
Oliver waves his hands for quiet. “Ah ha ha. That brings me to my next announcement.” Oliver left a dramatic pause, pushing his spectacles up. He drew his next sentence out, piecemeal.  
“The first batch of these... is going to be served up... to celebrate the opening of the first processing plant... which will be, albeit for no practical reason I can discern... at sunset tomorrow.”  
The assembled monsters give a cheer, pumping their fists and grinning.  
“I guess the boss likes a view with his dinner, right? You guys can go nuts, I won’t expect you to leave a single one of these delicious apes.” He smacked the sample human on the buttock again, before waving at his assistant to take it away.  
Oliver wouldn’t be joining the rest of them. He’d been invited upstairs to a special celebration, with none other than the boss himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's taken so long to update. My "writing skills" are "rusty."  
> Any help appreciated ;)  
> The mentions of borax solution may be ridiculously inaccurate. I gather that it's a minor skin irritant to humans.
> 
>  _Gavage_ ; forcible introduction via tube of food or drugs to the stomach, typically of livestock. Used in the production of foie gras.


End file.
